Year
A, Epiphany 7
When I was interviewing at my
previous church, I knew it was a good fit when I saw that they had a Dr. Pepper
soda machine…which had Diet Dr. Pepper.
It seemed like a direct message from God. This time, it was a little more subtle. I was reading your profile and it mentioned
that the brickwork is Flemish bond. I
thought Flemish bond…that’s my favorite kind of brick work! Ok, that was not it. When I was very young, my father was
stationed in Belgium. My brothers were
older and went to an American school but my parents thought it would be a good
experience for me to go to a Flemish school.
I learned very little since the teachers didn’t know English and I did
not know Flemish, but I still have a warm place in my heart for all things
Flemish. When I was on my tour, I made
sure to ask a question about the Flemish brick work, but the search committee
was not overly impressed with my Flemish expertise. Yet I had a hunch that the Flemish brick work
meant something about my place at St. John’s.
The Gospel reading today is our
final installment of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. We have been listening to it for several
weeks now. Last week I talked about
Jesus’ use of hyperbole to make important points. He spoke at length about laws regarding how
we are in relationship with one another, how we treat our brothers and sisters
in Christ. He had some helpful advice,
but definitely not easy advice. In fact,
some of what he said was so challenging, we often just gloss over it.
Today he says some things that are very
familiar to us, so familiar it’s easy to forget how incredibly radical they are
as well. “If anyone strikes you on the
right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your
coat, give your cloak as well…” “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute
you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven…” If we followed this advice literally, we
would never worry about self defense classes or protecting ourselves. We would not lock our cars, homes or churches
because we would let people steal what they want. Not only would we have to love our friends,
family and acquaintances who are sometimes hard to love; we would have to love
the people who are trying to ruin us, people like terrorists. How do you think it would go over if I added
Al Qaeda to the prayers of the people?
Then, because all of that isn’t
already hard enough, he concludes with, “Be perfect, therefore, as your
heavenly Father is perfect.” That kind
of ruins the whole thing, doesn’t it?
Everyone knows that no one is perfect.
In fact, being a perfectionist is considered a character defect,
something we feel we should overcome.
As is often the case when reading
scripture that has been translated by many different people over several
thousand years, some things have been a little lost in translation. For instance, the Greek word for perfect is
telios. The way the Greeks understood
telios is not the same way we understand perfection. Now we think of perfection as someone or
something without flaw or sin. The Greek
understanding of perfection was more functional. A thing is perfect if it fully realizes the
purpose for which it was planned, designed and made. Therefore humans are
perfect if we achieve the purpose for which we are created and sent into the
world. So you see, it is much easier
than we thought, all we need to do is figure out our purpose in life!
I will admit that seems a little
daunting, not as hard as perfection, but daunting nonetheless. However, Jesus
was pretty clear about our purpose in his Sermon on the Mount. It has something to do with the Greek word
for love. There are several Greek words
for love, but the one that is used in these verses and in most of the Bible is
agape, which is considered a divine love.
It means universal benevolence, unquenchable goodwill, and seeking the
highest good for every individual. That is different than brotherly/sisterly
love, parental love, or romantic love.
With agape love, it is less about the heart and more about the will. It
is about caring for that person who makes you insane, or that person who has
hurt you on the most profound level. It
is about seeing people, even your enemy, as God would see them. That kind of love seems almost
impossible….but just almost, not completely. In a way, it seems more reasonable
than thinking that we have to love our enemy like we love our partner, parent,
child, or dearest friend…because that is not the kind of love that Jesus is talking
about.
How do we find a way to love people who
have hurt us, maybe even scarred us? Jesus has some advice on that as
well. He says, “Pray for those who
persecute you.” That does not mean that
you pray that they stop persecuting you, because that would be more of a prayer
for yourself. Instead, you pray for them
out of good will and benevolence.
William Barclay, a commentator, wrote, “No one can pray for others and
still hate them. We cannot go on hating
others (when we are) in the presence of God.”
Prayer puts us in the presence of God, with the person for whom we are
praying.
I bet you are all wondering what this
has to do with Flemish bond bricks. One
of the appeals of the Flemish bond bricks is the appearance. They have glazed headers, which gives it a
checkerboard look and that makes it unique.
The bricks were individually made, so they are not all the same shape
and size. I read an article about St.
John’s that said the walls were constructed with roughly made, imprecisely
shaped bricks that are “full of subtle variations and corrections-even clever
adjustments- that the masons used as they persuaded those irregular bricks to
take highly regular patterns.”[1] When you look at it, you might call it
imperfect. It is because each brick was
individually made, just like each one of us is individually made by God. What makes these bricks so amazing is that it
is the variations that help them fit together, and that makes for a very strong
wall. It’s not just about beauty. It’s about strength as well.
Each one of us has something that makes
us imperfect in the worldly sense of the word, but absolutely perfect in the
Biblical sense of the word. Our
variations and corrections are the things that give us a unique purpose, and
when we put all those “imprecisely shaped” bricks together, we have a church, a
community of Christians who fit together and create something strong and
beautiful. In Paul’s letter to the
Corinthians, he talked about Jesus Christ being the foundation. I believe that Jesus is not only the
foundation, he is also the mortar that holds us all together. As a church, as individuals, he gives us
purpose. In our striving to live into
that purpose, we are moving towards perfection.
We will still have our flaws, but that is why we need one another. As individuals we are merely roughly shaped
bricks. Together, with Jesus as our
mortar, we are a great wall that no person, no one thing can ruin.
[1]
Erickson, John. Daily Press: “Hampton
church’s Colonial brick hides an ornate Victorian interior.” 8/1/1998
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